


What Would Happen If We Kissed

by clicktrack_heart



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Gen, Threats of Rape/Non-Con, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-25
Updated: 2015-07-25
Packaged: 2018-04-11 02:41:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4417883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clicktrack_heart/pseuds/clicktrack_heart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After her suicide attempt, Beth gets out of bed at Andrea's urging. Stuff happens and Beth ends up giving three different kisses that mean three very different things.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What Would Happen If We Kissed

**Author's Note:**

> Again another fic that took me an embarrassing amount of time to write and I’m still not satisfied! Consider it a small offering to the awesomeness of Team Bethyl anyway.

Falling and falling. She prepared for the crash landing, the scattered bones and broken cries. Dead faces staring up at her, her brother weeping. Her mother screaming.

And screaming. 

Dimly, she realized her landing had been painless. Her hands and feeds could move, even through the mush of blackened skin.The pit of bodies became slowly familiar. Beneath it, there was the wall paper her mom picked out for the guest room, inspired by an issue of O magazine. Beth would know that lilac floral print anywhere. She wormed her small body through bloody corpses, trying to find her way through the gore and stench.

The limbs blocking her vision cleared. She had made it. Home. Or rather the guest room. The antique furniture from her father’s family, the lamp with the chipped base from when Maggie knocked it over that one time she wrestled with Shawn, and yes, the pretty but out-of-place designer wallpaper she had helped her momma with. All of it was here. 

But the screaming hadn’t stopped. Goosebumps pimpled her arms. It was the stranger in the guest bed. That was where the hoarse screams came from. Thick bandages covered the top of his head, and the bottom of his face was covered in shadow and the beginnings of a beard. His lips were moving, even in his sleep. The sheets had rolled back to reveal his smooth, lean chest. 

He moaned when she reached out to touch him, pulling away from her. All she wanted to do was rest her hand against his skin, to comfort him. Just so he knew he wasn’t alone.

But every time her hand lifted, he tried to get further away from her. Why couldn’t she help him? She looked down at her open hands, saw the blood dripping from her wrist. 

~*~*~

“C’mon, get up honey.”

Beth growled. She literally growled at the no-nonsense voice, burying her head into her flat pillow that smelled of stale sweat. Already her dream was fleeting, and her reality was settling in again. 

She lay still for a few seconds, imagining what Andrea saw. 

The image of a too frail girl, limp and motionless in a dirty bed came to her. Beth didn’t care what Andrea thought, but right then at that moment, she didn’t like the mental picture of herself. 

_“Wake up, sunshine.”_

It wasn’t Andrea’s voice that roused her, it was the sweet tones of her mom.

Beth could see it so easily. Her mom standing in her doorway, framed by a of morning light, teasing her sleepy daughter. _“Nelly ain’t gonna ride herself. Did you stay up too late writing in your journal? Don’t tell me you were on the phone with that boy! Well, you better get that tush downstairs if you want a hot breakfast.”_

A smile nearly crossed Beth’s chapped lips as she remembered. And then, just as quickly, a crushing fist closed over her heart and its nails buried in. 

Her momma was gone. 

She had lost her to the same man who took her Nelly. But she knew, deep down, that it wasn’t truly his fault. She supposed he had saved her from whatever disease her momma had contracted. Despite what her dad said, there was no explanation for what all had happened to her family. Her momma had already been dead when the doors to the barn had opened. 

The realization didn’t numb her grief or apathy. But the pain was somehow sharper when she realized how disappointed her momma would be to see her daughter now. 

It was this that finally compelled her to speak to Andrea, who she knew was still standing there, tapping impatient fingers on the lacquer of Beth’s dresser.

“What is it?” she lifted her head from her pillow, turning red-rimmed eyes to Andrea’s. “What do you want? Her voice was dry from lack of use.

“You can’t stay in her forever,” Andrea said, crossing her arms over her chest. Beth recognized her stubbornness well. She had the most stubborn of sisters after all. 

“I told you, I’m better,” Beth said. “I won’t do... what I did again.”

Andrea pursed her lips, considering. “I know you won’t. But what else will you do?”

Beth shrugged. She knew it didn’t matter.

“What I want to know is, do you want to get out of here and do something a little... crazy? Something the others don’t expect?” Andrea asked, quirking her eyebrows as she leaned on the door to Beth’s room. 

Beth’s mouth twitched and she couldn’t help it, she shifted a little from her fetal position and she knew Andrea noticed. How long had it been since she had seen the sun? Dreamed of faces other than her dead family or a strange man that had slept in her family’s guest room for a few days? To be outside, free... She couldn’t deny it _called_ to her. 

“I want to leave here,” she told the other woman. It would have come out like a demand except for the sad little sniffle at the end that Beth couldn’t quite keep at bay.

“Good. If that’s what you want, I’m your golden ticket,” Andrea replied. “But you’re gonna need to do a few things for me first.”

~*~*~ 

Two hours later and Beth had shot her first target, a rusty can of Coke. 

Her arm had gone slightly numb from experiencing the recoil of Andrea’s pistol on the several different attempts it took for her to hit her target, but she had done it, she finally did it.

She looked at Andrea and Andrea was already smiling at her, sharing sweetly in her excitement. 

“You’re a natural,” she told Beth. “You belong out here.” 

Beth lowered the gun with pride, knowing she was blushing. 

“Thank you,” she admitted. “For teachin’ me. It felt good to do something on my own. You were right.”

From beneath the brim of her cowboy hat, Andrea grinned with honeyed satisfaction. She threw her arm affectionately around Beth’s shoulders. “Oh honey, we’re gonna be good friends.” 

Timidly, but smiling, Beth nodded. 

“In fact, I think I know what you need now. Besides a shower,” Andrea continued playfully. 

Beth’s eyebrows rose in a silent question.

Andrea considered her, suddenly serious. “We’re going on a run in a few days. And you should come.”

Beth’s jaw dropped but Andrea plowed on, more than ready to make her case.

“You’re old enough. My sister let her guard down and I don’t want to see you do the same. You need the experience.” 

“My dad will never let me,” Beth protested. 

“Let me deal with him,” Andrea said firmly. “We’ve got a few days to convince him. This is the first time you’ve been out of bed since...” she shook her head. “I think he’ll see the light.”

Beth stiffened. “You can say it.”

Andrea frowned. “Say what?”

“This is the first time I’ve been out of bed since the barn. You can just say it. I’m not a child.” Her jaw clenched as she addressed the other woman with as much pride as she could muster, even as the cold metal of Andrea’s gun brushed against her bandaged wrist. “I can take it, Andrea.”

Andrea’s gray-blue eyes widened and after a moment, she shook her head. “I don’t know what it is about you Greenes.”

“Hidden depths comes to mind,” she added, smirking at Beth. 

Beth smiled back. Hours later since leaving her room, she admitted to herself she didn’t feel great, but she did feel better. There was something about being outside again for the first time since the barn opened like Pandora’s box. 

The Georgia sun caressed her with warmth and she knew though she still felt that same hollowed ache in her gut, she was done crying in bed. 

She missed her momma, her brother. And nothing, none of dad’s medicine, no magic cure was going to bring them back now.

They weren’t just sick. They were gone. And now Beth had to deal with the aftermath. She had to survive. For them. For herself. She had to be strong. And she felt like maybe she could do it after all. 

~*~*~

True to her word, Andrea had found a way to convince her dad that what his suicidal daughter needed was to get out off of the farm for a day. Beth hadn’t been present but she heard her father and Maggie arguing about it at night time. Strangely, Maggie had sided with Andrea.

“We can’t protect her forever daddy,” Maggie pleaded before Beth snuck back upstairs.

The next day, Andrea had come to her triumphantly after the Greenes had ate breakfast. The kitchen was empty and Beth had begun to put the dirty dishes in the sink after her family finished eating. 

“We won!” Andrea said, reaching over to give Beth’s soapy hand a fist bump. 

“Really?” Beth asked, grinning right back, though the expression felt strange now.

“Yep,” Andrea said, but her gleeful expression turned serious quickly. “So we’re gonna go over the run around 5 today, before we head out. I already told your dad this but I’m telling you now too--we’re not doing anything dangerous. We’re going to the old Rite-Aid that Shane and Rick have already gone to a few times. It’s clean and there’s still some good supplies to get.”

Beth nodded, her heart leaping. “OK,” she agreed, still smiling lightly at Andrea. “I’m going to practice shooting some more after I get these dishes done.”

~*~*~

The rest of the day flew by. Her papa was looking at her strangely as Beth did her chores with a new gusto, even showering again before the hot water ran out for the day. If there were the occasional odd look from him or her sister though, she didn’t care. She was going off the farm! She hadn’t been allowed to since Shawn had first been bitten.

“Bethy?” her papa asked. Beth shook, looking up from her smooth hands. She had been thinking about Shane’s dead, grey ones. 

“Yes, daddy?” she asked, grateful for the distraction from her own thoughts.

“You be careful tonight,” he said gravely. He set down his weathered bible to fix her with his most serious of parental stares. “That Andrea argues a tough case and Rick swears she knows what she is doing but I don’t want you to get too caught up with them. These aren’t our sort of people and I’m letting you go with them against my better judgement.”

Beth nodded, chewing her peanut butter and jelly sandwich but not really tasting it though it stuck to the roof of her mouth stubbornly. “I won’t do anything bad, daddy. And I’ll be so careful,” she promised. And then she smiled sweetly, licking her lips clean of jelly. “You’re the best.” 

She leaned forward and pressed a kiss to her papa’s grizzled cheek before she ran outside to meet Andrea and the others.

But one person stood in her way, kept her from running full out. Jimmy was sitting on the bottom steps, facing away from her.

His back stiffened as the screen door slammed behind her.

“Hi Jimmy.”

Jimmy hesitated before looking over his shoulder at her.

“You’ve been avoiding me all week, Beth,” he said. “What do you want me to say?”

Her shoulders drooped. “I’m sorry. I really am.” She balanced from one foot to the other. She could see Andrea and some of the men, just beyond the fences.

“Can we talk about it later? Andrea asked me to go on a run,” she said finally, not daring to delay any longer. 

“I heard,” he replied sullenly.

She came towards the stairs, and their eyes met. Beth looked into the gaze of the boy she had known since she wore diapers, and felt nothing. “I really gotta go, Jimmy,” she said and then knowing how that sounded, she stooped down to his level to press a kiss to his cheek. 

Then she was running, letting her legs carry her in a way she hadn’t done in a long time. 

Andrea and the others were all waiting at the edge of her family’s land. Beth only slowed when they all turned to stare at her strangely. 

She looked curiously at the three men who gathered there and then at Andrea. Beth knew she was out of place, standing there amongst them with her bright yellow top and sparkly bracelets stacked on the one wounded wrist.

It was then she felt her forehead crease with worry as she stood in the hot sun, a single sweat tear sliding down the small of her back from jogging to meet with them. Doubt permeated her resolve. Maybe she should have stayed with Jimmy.

“What is this?” Shane finally asked, tearing his incredulous eyes from her to look at Andrea. 

“Beth is going on the run with us,” Andrea told the men in a bold voice that while not entirely confident, managed to convey an air of finality. Her full lips curved into a pretty and confident smile that Beth very much admired. T-Dog gave her a tiny grin which Beth returned gratefully.

“Well alrighty then, I see you finally slipped the leash of your daddy, huh,” Shane grinned wolfishly at Beth, as if sizing her up. Beth realized this was probably the first time he had ever paid any real attention to her and it made her feel sticky and uncomfortable for a reason she didn’t know.

But the other one, the one who stole her Nelly, the one she and her father nursed back to health from a gunshot wound, he openly scowled at her. 

He was scruffy but handsome in a completely unaware way. Beth knew he was unaware about people in general. When she had helped her dad nurse him, if she touched him to check his temperature or something, he jerked away from her as if she had burned him, even in his sleep.

But she was lying to herself if she said that was when she first noticed him. She had always been curious about the most shy, and somehow, the most rough, of all the strangers who had come to her papa’s farm. 

As the others talked, Daryl remained quiet but continued to stare disbelievingly at her every few seconds. Beth suddenly felt as if she was shrinking under his harsh gaze and she knew, though she had done her best to help him after he was shot, cleaning his wound everyday, it didn’t matter to him. Maybe he thought a weakling like her was only meant to serve doing dishes and laundry, or maybe he didn’t remember how she had tried her best to nurse him when he had been unconscious. Beth knew it didn’t matter, not really, but his plain dislike of her dampened her mood.

Sudden shame ebbed into her gut. Her suicide attempt was no secret on the farm. Daryl probably knew, that’s why he looked the way he did. He was someone who had fought so hard to save a little girl, almost dying in the process himself. She probably seemed like a silly teenager to him, or worse, a complete waste of space. 

Meekly, she looked down at her feet, at the toes of her boots and the scuff marks they left in the dry cracked earth beneath them. She almost wished she could sink into the fine grains of soil but forced herself to pay attention to Shane’s directions.

“Once we’re there, we’ll divide up and each one of us will have a list to figure out as best we can.”

Daryl shook his head at Shane’s words, drawing Beth’s cautious gaze again against her will. 

“I’m just trying to figure out why we’re babysittin’ on our runs now?” he asked. “Just can’t wrap my mind around that.”

He stared at Beth accusingly. She flushed.

“Daryl!” Andrea scolded. “Beth needs the training, everyone does here and you know it. We all gotta start somewhere.”

“Yeah, Daryl,” T-Dog drawled. “This ain’t your trailer park. Women can make up their own mind here.”

“Fuck off,” Daryl huffed, turning towards his motorcycle but stopped to look over his shoulder one last time.

Beth felt her face heat up. With dark eyes, Daryl was looking right back at her, studying her and taking her measure. Somehow it mattered to her that he didn’t see her as weak or beneath him. Her small chin jutted out stubbornly as she tried to fix him with a stare as hard as he gave her right back. 

His jaw clenched at her response, eyes turning stormy blue. Then, it faded as he shook his head again, snorting. 

“‘Alrigh’,” he said to Andrea, but he was still looking at Beth. “She better pull her own weight.”

“I just need instructions,” Beth gritted out, not wanting him to have the last word. 

Andrea laughed, her eyes sparking as she looked at Beth. _What did I tell you,_ her gaze seemed to say. 

“She’ll be great!” she said. T-Dog and Shane smiled too but Beth noted to herself that the former cop’s smile never quite reached his eyes. 

 

~*~*~

At the Rite-Aid, they divided. Andrea sent Beth and Shane into the rather picked over personal care items, each with their own small list.

With quick and eager fingers, Beth rummaged through the band-aids, looking for the ones that already had Neosporin. She remembered the last time she came here, months and months ago, looking for pads for her period. Life had been normal. Afterwords she had probably meet Jimmy for milkshakes, just to satisfy her chocolate cravings. So much had changed since then.

A low laugh interrupted her daydreams.

Glancing up, Beth cautiously set down the antibiotic creams she had been studying. Shane was standing over by the hosiery and tee-shirt packages. There was a mirror there she knew, and Shane was facing it, with his back to her.

Slowly, quietly, she made her way to him.

As she stood behind him, she could see what he had laughed at. He held a tee-shirt up to his chest, white and printed with the bold words “World’s Greatest Dad”. 

She nearly smiled at seeing the softer side of the man but it quickly faded when she realized something was off in his twisted and reflected grin. There was something... unhinged. Suddenly she thought of Rick’s sad eyes, of Lori, with her big and swollen belly.

Beth gasped. Loud, too loud. 

Shane tensed in front of the mirror and spun towards her in shocked fury, dropping his dad shirt. “What the fuck?”

“You fucking spying on me?” he repeated quietly, dangerously. 

She shook her head frantically, stepping backwards even as he closed in on her. He grabbed her peasant blouse with thick fingers. 

“What. did. you. see.”

“Nothing, I’m sorry, please,” she whimpered, staring up at him. He looked so angry, a big vein bulged at the top of his nearly bare skull. 

He stared at her uncomprehendingly and Beth realized he wasn’t even listening to her. 

He grabbed her face with one large hand, practically swallowing it up. His thumb and fingers bore into the sides of her cheeks, smushing her lips together as if she were making a fish face. 

“Hush,” he commanded in a low voice. “Be quiet or I’ll break your little fucking neck.”

She stilled as much as she could, tears running down her face and his hand as she looked up at him. He glanced away from her for a second and looked around the store blankly. 

When he glanced at her again, it was with that same empty, yet measuring stare he had given her on the farmland earlier. He licked his lips slowly, tightening his hand on her waist. 

“How old are you anyway?”

Beth shook her head. She couldn’t speak, her lips were squeezed together so tight. She didn’t even want to open her mouth. He pulled her face closer to his and she could feel his hot and sour breath on her skin. Terrified, she quivered uncontrollably in his rough grip. 

“Here’s what’s gonna happen,” he said forcefully. “We’re gonna go into the bathroom over there, real quiet like.” He forced her head to turn so she could see the dark, open door to the staff bathroom to the right of them. She whimpered, but he didn’t notice.

“You’re gonna be so quiet, you aren’t gonna make a sound, OK? And if you make even a little peep, I’m going to hurt you so bad you’ll wish you had slit your wrists the right way once I’m done with you.”

Beth nodded slowly, tears blurring her vision. She felt her body go limp as he started to lead her away. And then she wasn’t thinking with rhyme or reason anymore. She reared back with an animal-like cry, her hand, all fingernails hooked into claws, slashed brutally at Shane’s face, 

Flesh went under her nails, then wet, lots of wetness. She was nearly as shocked as he was. 

“Bitch,” he hissed. He released her abruptly to clutch at the deep gouges in his face, staring at the blood incredulously. Then he looked at her with pitch black eyes.

She still held her hand up as it was a weapon, though it was shaking.

Thick muscles in Shane’s neck coiled and tensed as he took a step closer to her, and Beth opened her mouth to scream, knowing scratching him would only be a surprise the first time.

“What the _fuck_ are you doing?”

T-Dog.

Shane stared behind her towards the voice, his face darkening. Beth didn’t want to let him out of her sight but she pivoted slightly and she saw both T-Dog and _Daryl_ approach.

T-Dog was stunned, staring at Shane as if he couldn’t believe what he was seeing, but it was Daryl who clutched white-knuckled at his drawn arrow, aiming straight for Shane’s head.

Her breath caught and held painfully beneath her lungs. She wanted to cry with relief.

“This little psycho just scratched me out of nowhere,” Shane told them, holding out his thick, bloody fingers. 

“What the _hell_ is going on?” Andrea rounded the corner by the sunscreen display. “I heard yelling.”

“This fucker just attacked Beth,” Daryl growled. He was still holding his bow and arrow.

“Shut it redneck,” Shane scowled. “Andrea, this crazy bitch...” he stared wildly at all of them. “She fucking stabbed me. She told me she wanted to bring the geeks on us!”

Andrea looked back and forth from Beth to Shane, with narrowed eyes. Then, almost imperceptibly, the light in her, the very thing that had charmed Beth... dimmed. 

Beth stared, stunned, not sure what it meant.

“Daryl, put the damn bow down,” Andrea ordered. 

But Daryl was still looking at Beth, and he didn’t budge an inch. 

“It’s OK,” Beth whispered to him. She didn’t know why but she felt like she needed to say it. 

Almost entirely silently, Daryl lowered his bow. Beth felt their group’s eyes on her yet again.

“We can’t have this conversation here. We’ll talk about this back on the farm, OK?” 

Shane started to complain but Andrea cut him off. “This is not the time or place Shane.”

She stared at all of them flatly. “Can everyone cut the bullshit for a second so we can get back safely?”

Her gaze landed on Beth last, and Beth couldn’t help but notice the sudden distance there.

Shane must’ve saw it too because his broad chest puffed up. “Yeah, that’s a good idea.”

Uneasily, the group began to gather the supplies. Beth stayed close to Daryl and T-Dog just in case though Shane didn’t come close to her, hovering by Andrea’s side instead. No one talked but Beth offered T-Dog a timid smile when she caught his worried expression. 

As they left the old pharmacy, Daryl handed her his helmet silently. She took it from him without question, knowing his intention. The motor roared as they left the others behind. 

The night was black around them like a big blanket. Even from the clear plastic visor of the helmet, Beth could see the stars were as beautiful as ever, even with the stray walker here and there ambling after them. She felt an inexpressible sorrow for them as they flew past. She wondered if there was anyone left to cry for them, to _feel anything_ for them. 

Shane’s threats still echoed but his voice grew softer as she sank into Daryl’s warmth, folding her body into his back. 

It wasn’t until they were almost to the farm that she realized her first ride on a motorcycle was almost finished. 

“You OK?” Daryl asked, once he parked his bike by the old tree he always kept it by. 

“Yeah,” Beth said, handing him his helmet. She stared up at him until he glanced away as if she made him nervous. The thought made her tummy flip.

“Are you OK?” she asked.

“Mmhhmm,” he mumbled. 

Daryl bent down without further comment and started to check the tires of his bike. She wondered if she was supposed to leave, but she didn’t want to.

“Why didn’t you help me? With Shane?” Beth asked then, just to say something, just to hold to his attention a little longer.

Daryl froze without looking at her, thinking for a moment. His words were soft, she could barely make out the words.

“You could take care of yourself.”

Then he turned his head away from the bike to see her. She couldn’t read his expression or the sudden emotion in his eyes. He rose up from his knees, the strong, lean muscles of his arm and chest flexing as he gave his bike a pat. 

“Thank you,” Beth said, struggling to find the right words. 

Daryl’s face reddened. “You don’t need ta thank me. Besides I saw where he was leadin’ ya to. I would have killed him as soon as ya were out of my shot.”

“I want to thank you,” she said earnestly, taking another step towards him. 

“I shoulda killed him,” Daryl muttered to himself.

“He’s a...” Beth couldn’t continue. But the word _monster_ hung in the air between them regardless. Strange how it never occurred to her to call the things that wanted to ear her flesh that word. 

“Rick will take care of him,” Daryl promised. “And if he doesn’t... we will.”

A sense of wonder came to her as she stared at Daryl, his clenched jaw, his lean and muscular frame and she knew he was fully capable of what he said. He was the kind of man that took promises deeper than the grave. 

“You’re not afraid of anything, are you,” she stated. “You went after that little girl, you took on Shane tonight. You kill walkers like it’s nothin’.”

He glanced up at her in surprise. “It ain’t nothin’,” he muttered quietly. 

Beth waited for him to say more but he only ducked his head again, hair falling over his face. More than anything, she wanted to cup his head in gentle hands, kiss his face. The thought made her breathless. The kiss wouldn’t be in a comforting way like she did with her papa or like she had with Jimmy earlier... just _to pacify._

No, Beth wanted to consume, taste and... keep going. 

She took a step closer, registering how Daryl unconsciously seemed to shrink back. The flicker of fear in his eyes only made her feel bolder. 

Her heart was pulsing so fast she could feel it down to her toes. 

With one last step, her diminutive frame had trapped Daryl’s strong body against the frame of his own bike. She was so close she could make out his scent--leather, pine and grease. He would have to shove her out of the way to stop her lips from pressing against his cheek. But he didn’t. And she didn’t stop at his cheek either, though she let her mouth drift against his stubbled jaw, just to feel the roughness against the petal smooth skin of her lips.

Her eyes closed when she did kiss him, pressing her mouth to his. 

Warmth filled her with just the smallest touch. And she swore, his lips moved back. Ever so slightly. He kissed her, in a way that was almost impossible to perceive, as light as the touch of a shadow. 

Face burning, she slowly pulled away from his motionless form.

His eyes dropped almost immediately.

“Goodnight Daryl,” she finally managed. “See ya tomorrow.”

Then she carefully walked away without a glance back. 

She needed to cool off, let her thoughts about the day roll over her. There was so much to tell her journal. Tomorrow would be hard. She’d have to talk to T-Dog and Daryl again. She would probably see Shane. Her sister would bug her for all the details and she’d have to sort things out with Andrea too. 

Beth was tired but not hopeless, she realized later, as she crawled into bed. She thought about Daryl again, how warm he had felt when she pressed against him on his motorcycle, about the way his lips on hers had made her feel. There was heat between her legs when she replayed the scene, remembering how his mouth had trembled against hers.

For the first time, she wondered if Daryl dreamed of her. She thought he just might.

**Author's Note:**

> Feedback is warming and cherished. Crit is lovely.


End file.
